The present invention relates to a method of sealing an object connected to infinite elongated bodies such as pipe lines, wire systems or the like, easily and in a tamper-proof or anti-forgery manner. More particularly, the invention is concerned with a sealing method which is effective in material accountancy of nuclear materials.
The "material accountancy" of nuclear materials is defined as quite important safeguards. The "safeguards" is used as a generic term of various means for watching the nuclear materials and facilities to prevent the diversion of these materials and facilities from peaceful objects to military purposes, detecting possible diversion without delay and proving occurence of no diversion. As auxiliary means for the material accountancy, there have been developed effective "containment" technique and "surveillance" technique. Unfortunately, however, these developed techniques are still unsatisfactory.
In a uranium enrichment plant, for instance, it is proposed to seal flange joint portions of pipes to detect and prevent unauthorized re-jointing of the pipes. Such a seal has to meet various requirements such as easiness of the sealing work, high tamper-proof effect, high aging resistance and so forth. In addition, since the pipes usually have infinite length, the seal has to be effected only on the flange portion of the pipes, which in turn requires a specific device.